Never judge a book by its cover. Which is just as well, considering the album art for the McDonald and Giles self-titled CD that landed in my post box this morning. PHWORRR! Talk about pinups etc.

I know very little about the duo apart from the King Crimson connections. Even then the names were new to me. The track Flight of the Ibis stood out on a recent Late Junction early morning listening. Interesting, I thought. I’ll have a bit of that.

The album has early 1970s prog jazz written all over it. I’m increasingly finding myself being drawn towards this type of nonsense. You can get yourself lost in the music and not have to think about 2026.

Modern life is rubbish, etc.

I can’t but help think that this is Dukes of Hazzard outtakes. Country rock is cool; country soul is even cooler. Sadly this is neither really. It’s bloody annoying banjos. They did my nut in tbh. It did pick up right at the end with the Don’t Be Cruel cover. Country rock ‘n’ roll is early Elvis, right?

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I just played my two summer albums. That’s my two summer albums of 2025 - Weller’s excellent El Dorado, and Emma Jean’s Weirdo. Both got rinsed heavily from around July onwards through until Autumn. The recent run of Estuary Wilds SCORCHIO weather triggered a muscle memory within me to fire them up.

I’m clearly in need of some summer jams, as the kids may say, for 2026. I bloody love a good summer album. It’s something that defines those early starts, taking you through into hazy afternoons, and then carrying through until the end of the day. Repeat, repeat, repeat. I’m not sure what’s out there right now tbh.

Weller always finds me. There’s not a lot of algorithm dropping going off there. Emma Jean came via Gilles Peterson. Most of my new music is through GP these days, with occasional input from R over text.

A summer album does have a special quality. The seasonal thing needn’t be obvious, but there has to be a hint of a change of the season. It also helps if it’s running music, something I can fire up, and then head out plodding for an hour long leg stretcher - assuming my six month muscle injury ever heals.

I might just stick with the Weirdo album. It’s lush, introverted and has a head nod at celebrating the freaks. I fit in there quite well.

A sugar rush of a sunshine prog rock album that landed unexpectedly in my feeds this morning. There’s an interesting Beatles non-backstory here. That pulled me in. 3:47 EST is an innocent, often naive album. It tries to create what The Beatles might have been in the mid ’70s. It’s an endless speculation that I find hard to escape. “If The Beatles don’t exist, you don’t exist,” etc. I love the optimism and the bubblegum pop. It’s also why punk had to happen.

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Happy Happy Joy Joy. The early 80’s were bleak. Someone needed to soundtrack it. But you can have humour in amongst all the nuclear fall out. The Two Tribes videos shows you how. The Final Cut is so far up its own arse that it can’t connect with the audience - either mainstream or even muso snobs. It’s an empty album that talks to no one but itself. It’s the sound of a band being slowly put to sleep. Instant gratification would have been better.

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Yeah yeah - I’ve gone down something of a prog rabbit hole this morning. Aphrodite’s Child is the album that Pink Floyd should have made as their final sign off. It rambles on and on and bloody on. But it still kept my attention whilst going about my morning tasks. It must all mean something. I’ve no idea what. That the appeal of prog, right? The band name is awful, as is the album art. Never judge a book, etc. Decent.

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A complete hairdryer of an album - in every respect. Style and substance, it’s the big blow dry that then sucks you into the screeching sound as the music it blasted at you. I don’t know why it’s called soft rock. There’s nothing half, erm, hearted about this. It’s ridiculous of course. I quite like the pantomime feel to the bangers like What About Love and These Dreams. Heart were never cool, and neither was I.

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HYPE ALERT: The opening two tracks that segue Kayleigh into Lavender gives The Beatles' closing tracks on Abbey Road a run for its money. Blimey. Hype over. Misplaced Childhood is still a bloody great album, completely out of step, then and now. Marillion stood out like, well, like a time machine gone wrong back in 1985. It was quite a bold move during such tribal times. I could never commit to them back in the day, despite secret bedroom playbacks. I don’t give a shit these days. I bloody love Marillion. Fish. He’s a one.

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Very rustic, very laboured. Yet still there’s a soul element running through from start to finish. Bob Elms dropped a track over the weekend. Nice, I thought. The third album from The Band is new to me. My finger hovered over a cheapo cheapo ebay purchase. The stream finished. I couldn’t quite bring myself to committing.

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This was a random listen after Late Junction dropped the track Flight of the Ibis. I admit to never having heard of McDonald & Giles. The modern internet wasn’t a great deal of help, either.

Flight of the Ibis is lush. The production is so rich with the analogue bass and drums pushing the song forward. It’s a hazy song for the current May hazy days. It would probably work well during mid-winter as well.

Elsewhere and the rest of the album is half decent. Things get incredibly funky on The Workshop. The random sax blowing in and out is a nice touch. Plus I do love an album that has a ‘suite’ of songs. The styles change, but they still sound connected.

This is quite a breakthrough record for an album that came out in 1970. It takes the King Crimson blueprint, but adds a lot more energy and vibe. I doubt that vibe was a thing in the year I was born. Christ, this album is old, much like me…

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